Bend _it is a small-scale testing equipment designed and prototyped as a part of seminar subject, Computational Design and Digital Fabrication at ITECH course, University of Stuttgart. Curvature is directly proportional to geometrical stiffness and therefore increases the load bearing capacity of a structure. However, it is difficult to fabricate curved geometries. Thin and elastic building material provide opportunity to induce curvature through active bending.
The designed equipment provides the opportunity to test and understand the geometrical limits and mechanical properties of bending active building materials. It uses sensors and actuators to extract these properties. A load cell is used to measure the thrust force exerted by the bent structure, whereas an accelerometer is used to extract the geometrical data. This data is live streamed to MS excel using a simple Arduino code, where it could be used for further analysis.

Publication A. Shah, R. Daley “BEND_it : Don’t Stress out just “BEND_it out.” Instructables, 14 July 2020, www.instructables.com/BENDit-Dont-Stress-Out-Just-BENDit-Out/